of and notoriety has been picked for the top spot in Strong Hill's kitchen. "He's digging up 100-year-old Southern recipes but then adding his own little twist to them," Weaver said. "Not every dish will be froufrou.
..but they will be high end, they will be Southern and they will have (Levesque's) own flair to it as well.
" Besides the expected high quality of the cuisine, Weaver said most aspects of the Strong Hill will lean towards a proper fine dining experience. "The wait staff will be trained as to the proper way to pour a bottle of wine and on which arm to hang their towel and other things like that. It's going to be a little more prim and proper on that end of things.
" Besides bringing more overall economic life to the area, Weaver is also hoping the restaurant will bring a little more night life to the Boulevard. "The boulevard is such an industrial area, after 5 o'clock, it's dead," she said. "We just want to bring some more life to the Boulevard.
As it is now River City and Buz and Ned's are the only places opened after 5. It's kind of like we are off on an island over here." The Weaver's placement of popular local bartender as the restaurant's manager could help remedy that.
So could the fact Strong Hill is planned to have one of the most diverse alcoholic beverage selections in town, short of a few of Richmond's seemingly unbeatable establishments. "It won't be like Capital Ale House but it will be recognized for the amount of different beers and wine that we will have there," Weaver said. "We are also hoping to have a pretty sizable martini bar area as well.
We want to have that dinner crowd but after a certain point we are looking to attract the bar crowd and nightlife as well." While Weaver expects that many of the 100 or so customers who visit her tattoo company each day will also frequent the restaurant, she also has big hopes to attract residents of the multiple housing projects going up nearby in Scott's Addition. "Right behind here, the (Condos) were just built and one or two companies are building other condos back here.
There's going to be like 60 to 80 condos back there and that is going to bring a lot of life to the area as well if we have something to give them." Though Weaver originally opened her tattoo and piercing shop on the Boulevard in 2002 to isolate herself from the other tattoo shops in the area, she said she quickly fell in love with Scott's Addition and the Boulevard. After renting for two years, Weaver bought the building in which River City Tattoo Co.
is housed and began looking to purchase as much real estate in the area as she could. In 2006, the Weavers bought the building across the street with plans for their restaurant in mind. "It was going really well for use here and I decided that this is where I wanted to stay and I wanted to make something out of it and this area," she said.
"So I bought this building and we immediately started looking around. "We're doing good but people come here because it is River City. They would seek us out anywhere.
But we are off on an island here. This area needs it and we aren't going to leave so we might as well revitalize the area and bring life to where we are. We're not going to go anywhere so it just makes sense to help out this area.
"I really have high hopes for this area and I think it is going to be pretty awesome. If people knew then what we all know now about Oregon Hill, we would all be breaking our backs trying to have a piece of that. I think this is going to be the next big thing to happen.
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